Honeymoon Cottage
Matt Brooks
When in 1962 young Dale Parker gets thrown out of the house
by his father, he has no choice but to find his own path. After a brief attempt at city living, he
makes his way to a seaside town where he begins to make a life. He meets Rey Duran, twenty years his elder
and a member of a huge, historic area family… and gorgeous. They start to date and in no time Dale is
part of Rey’s family, but not in the way Dale might hope.
This novel is a story of how two people can complete each
other through love, through "becoming one", the purpose of the image of the named honeymoon cottage. Rey comes from a big and loving
family that accepts his being gay. He
has spent his adulthood in a creative profession and has “dozens and dozens of
nephews and cousins” but he has no one special in his life. He feels directionless, adrift. Dale on the other hand knows precisely where
he is going, or at least how he is going to get there, working hard, saving
money, and planning to get his GED and go to college. Almost the moment he
meets Rey he knows it’s for keeps. His
loveless family is amply replaced by the Duran familia, but it is clear that Dale is self sufficient and sure of
himself in spite of the cold childhood home in which he was raised. Rey is put off by Dale’s youth, assuming his
eye will wander, that he will prove ungrounded and flighty, not seeing that in
fact Dale is the solid, mature person in the relationship, that it is Rey
himself he who will by his lack of commitment threaten the future they might
have.
What I loved about this well written and thoughtful story is
its depictions of everyday average people, not hyper-masculine heroes with
dangerous professions, like spies and cops.
Those are fun, but what we need are people like us to show us how they live,
dream, and cope. With Dale and Rey we
have people whose foibles we understand and can identify with. And the best news about that is that it means
that maybe we can have what Rey and Dale have, that promise of love and
belonging.
Pay attention to the small clues that foreshadow the developments
in the story if you want to see the author’s sensitive writing skill in action.
As a bonus, the author describes a landscape he knows,
having lived through it, during a time when gay people were just beginning to
find acceptance at least within their own social and sometimes familial circle. But this is not a fantasy world. The threat is there restricting the public
celebration of love that no straight couple would expect to have. This is a hopeful story, but not at all a
silly one.
Perhaps one of the most charming elements for this reader
was seeing two characters from another well-loved source, Lucas and Thomas from
Brian Holliday’s stories on Wilde Oats.
How often does one get to see the joyful promise of loving partners in
their own future realized?
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